
: 



o 




What Must We Do to 
be Saved? 



A LECTURE 

BY J 

Robert G. Ingersoll, 



Jnierpolations are the foundation stones of every Orthodox Church* 



Thoroughly Revised and Corrected bv the Author. 



Washington. D. C. 
C. P. FARRELL, PUBLISHER. 
1880. 



7r 




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, 
By ROBERT G. INGERSOLL, 
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 



PREFACE. 



If what is known as the Christian Religion is 
true, nothing can be more wonderful than the fact 
that Matthew, Mark and Luke say nothing about 
"salvation by faith;" that they do not even hint at 
the doctrine of the atonement, and are as silent as 
empty tombs as to the necessity of believing any- 
thing to secure happiness in this world or another. 

For a good many years it has been claimed that 
the writers of these gospels knew something about 
the teachings of Christ, and had, at least, a general 
knowledge of the^ conditions of salvation. It now 
seems to be substantiated that the early christians 
did not place implicit confidence in the gospels, and 
did not hesitate to make such changes and additions 
as they thought proper. Such changes and addi- 
tions are about the only passages in the New Test- 
ament that the Evangelical Churches now consider 



ii 



PREFACE. 



sacred. That portion of the last chapter of Mark, 
in which unbelievers are so cheerfully and promptly 
damned, has been shown to be an interpolation, and 
it is asserted that in the revised edition of the New 
Testament, soon to be issued, the infamous passages 
will not appear. With these expunged, there is not 
one word in Matthew, Mark, or Luke, even tend- 
ing to show that belief in Christ has, or can have, 
any effect upon the destiny of the soul. 

The four gospels are the four corner stones upon 
which rests the fabric of orthodox Christianity. 
Three of these stones have crumbled, and the fourth 
is not likely to outlast this generation. The gospel 
of John cannot alone uphold the infinite absurdity 
of vicarious virtue and vice, and it cannot, without 
the aid of u interpolation,' 1 sustain the illogical and 
immoral dogma of salvation by faith. These fright- 
ful doctrines must be abandoned ; the miraculous 
must be given up, the wonderful stories must be ex- 
punged, and from the creed of noble deeds the 
forgeries of superstition must be blotted out. From 
the temple of Morality and Truth — from the great 
windows towards the sun the parasitic and poison- 
ous vines of faith and fable must be torn. 

The church will be compelled at last to rest its 



PREFACE. 



Hi 



case, not upon the wonders Christ is said to have 
performed, but upon the system of morality he 
taught. All the miracles, including the resurrec- 
tion and ascension, are, when compared with por- 
tions of the u Sermon on the Mount," but dust 
and darkness. 

The careful reader of the New Testament will 
find three Christs described : — One who wished to 
preserve Judaism — one who wished to reform it, 
and one who built a system of his own. The 
apostles and their disciples, utterly unable to 
comprehend a religion that did away with sacrifices, 
churches, priests, and creeds, constructed a Chris- 
tianity for themselves, so that the orthodox church- 
es of to-day rest — first, upon what Christ endeav- 
ored to destroy — second., upon what he never said, 
and, third, upon a misunderstanding of what he did 
say. 

If a certain belief is necessary to insure the sal- 
vation of the soul, the church ought to explain, and • 
without any unnecessary delay, why such an infi- 
nitely important fact was utterly ignored by Mat- 
thew, Mark and Luke. There are only two expla- 
nations possible. Either belief is unnecessary, or 
the writers of these three gospels did not under- 



iv 



Preface. 



stand the Christian system. The " sacredness " of 
the subject cannot longer hide the absurdity of the 
u scheme of salvation," nor the failure of Matthew, 
Mark and Luke to mention, what is now claimed to 
have been, the entire mission of Christ. The 
church must take from the New Testament the 
supernatural ; the idea that an intellectual conviction 
can subject an honest man to eternal pain — the 
awful doctrine that the innocent can justly surfer 
for the guilty, and allow the remainder to be dis- 
cussed, denied or be lieved without punishment and 
without reward. No one will object to the preach- 
ing of kindness, honesty and justice. To preach 
less is a crime, and to practice more is impossible. 

There is one thing that ought to be again im- 
pressed upon the average theologian, and that is the 
utter futility of trying to answer arguments with 
personal abuse. It should be understood once for 
all that these questions are in no sense personal. If 
# it should turn out that all the professed christians in 
the world are sinless saints, the question of how 
Matthew, Mark, and Luke, came to say nothing 
about the atonement and the scheme of salvation by 
faith, would still be asked. And if it should then 
be shown that all the doubters, deists, and atheists, 



PREFACE. 



v 



are vile and vicious wretches, the question still 
would wait for a reply. 

The origin of all religions, creeds, and sacred 
books, is substantially the same, and the history of 
one, is, in the main, the history of all. Thus far 
these religions have been the mistaken explanations 
of our surroundings. The appearances of nature 
have imposed upon the ignorance and fear of man. 
But back of all honest creeds was, and is, the desire 
to know, to understand, and to explain, and that 
desire will, as I most fervently hope and earnestly 
believe, be gratified at last by the discovery of the 
truth. Until then, let us bear with the theories, 
hopes, dreams, mistakes, and honest thoughts of all. 

Robert G. Ingersoll. 

Washington, D. C, 
Oct., 1880. 



4 



CONTENTS. 



Introductory, - - n 

The Gospel of Matthew, ...... 24 

The Gospel of Mark, - - 31 

The Gospel of Luke, ----- - 45 

The Gospel of John, - - - - - 48 

The Catholics, 55 

The Episcopalians, - - - - - - 62 

The Methodists, 66 

• The Presbyterians, 71 

The Evangelical Alliance, - - - - - 76 

What Do You Propose? 81 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO 
BE SAVED? 



"The Nuremberg Man was operated by a combination of 
pipes and levers, and though he could breathe and 
digest perfectly, and even reason as well as most 
theologians, was made of nothing but wood and 

LEATHER." 

I. 

THE whole world has been filled with fear. 
Ignorance has been the refuge of the soul. 
For thousands of years the intellectual ocean was 
ravaged by the buccaneers of reason. Pious souls 
clung to the shore and looked at the lighthouse. 
The seas were filled with monsters and the islands 
with sirens. The people were driven in the middle 
of a narrow road while priests went before, beating 
the hedges on either side to frighten the robbers 
from their lairs. The poor followers seeing no 
robbers, thanked their brave leaders with all their 
hearts. 



12 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



Huddled in folds they listened with wide eyes 
while the shepherds told of ravening wolves. With 
great gladness they exchanged their fleeces for 
security. Shorn and shivering, they had the hap- 
piness of seeing their protectors comfortable and 
warm. 

Through all the years, those who plowed 
divided with those who prayed. Wicked industry 
supported pious idleness, the hut gave to the 
cathedral, and frightened poverty gave even its 
rags to buy a robe for hypocrisy. 

Fear is the dungeon of the mind, and supersti- 
tion is a dagger with which hypocrisy assassinates 
the soul. Courage is liberty. I am in favor of 
absolute freedom of thought. In the realm of 
mind every one is monarch ; every one is robed, 
sceptered, and crowned, and every one wears the 
purple of authority. I belong to the republic of 
intellectual liberty, and only those are good citizens 
of that republic who depend upon reason and upon 
persuasion, and only those are traitors who resort 
to brute force. 

Now, I beg of you all to forget just for a few 
moments that you are Methodists or Baptists or 
Catholics or Presbyterians, and let us for an hour 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



13 



or two remember only that we are men and women. 
And allow me to say " man " and "woman " are the 
highest titles that can be bestowed upon humanity. 

Let us, if possible, banish all fear from the 
mind. Do not imagine that there is some being 
in the infinite expanse who is not willing that every 
man and woman should think for himself and her- 
self. Do not imagine that there is any being who 
would give to his children the holy torch of reason, 
and then damn them for following that sacred light. 
Let us have courage. 

Priests have invented a crime called " blas- 
phemy," and behind that crime hypocrisy has 
crouched for thousands of years. There is but 
one blasphemy, and that is injustice. There is but 
one worship, and that is justice ! 

You need not fear the anger of a god that 
you cannot injure. Rather fear to injure your 
fellow-men. Do not be afraid of a crime you can 
not commit. Rather be afraid of the one that you 
may commit. The reason that you cannot injure 
God is that the Infinite is conditionless. You 
cannot increase or diminish the happiness of any 
being without changing that being's condition. If 
God is conditionless you can neither injure nor 
benefit him. 



14 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED ? 



There was a Jewish gentleman went into a res- 
taurant to get his dinner, and the devil of temp- 
tation whispered in his ear: "Eat some bacon." 
He knew if there was anything in the universe 
calculated to excite the wrath of an infinite being, 
who made every shining star, it was to see a 
gentleman eating bacon. He knew it, and he 
knew the infinite being was looking, that he was 
the eternal eavesdropper of the universe. But 
his appetite got the better of his conscience, as 
it often has with us all, and he ate that bacon. He 
knew it was wrong, and his conscience felt the 
blood of shame in its cheek. When he went into 
that restaurant the weather was delightful, the sky 
was as blue as June, and when he came out the sky 
was covered with angry clouds, the lightning 
leaping from one to the other, and the earth shaking 
beneath the voice of the thunder. He went back 
into that restaurant with a face as white as milk, 
and he said to one of the keepers: 

" My God, did you ever hear such a fuss about 
a little piece of bacon ?" 

As long as we harbor such opinions of infinity ; 
as long as we imagine the heavens to be filled with 
such tyranny, just so long the sons of men will be 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO B£ SAVED f 



15 



cringing, intellectual cowards. Let us think, and 
let us honestly express our thought. 

Do not imagine for a moment that I think people 
who disagree with me are bad people. I admit, and 
I cheerfully admit, that a very large proportion of 
mankind, and a very large majority, a vast number 
are reasonably honest. I believe that most Chris- 
tians believe what they teach ; that most ministers 
are endeavoring to make this world better. I do 
not pretend to be better than they are. It is an 
intellectual question. It is a question, first, of intel- 
lectual liberty, and after that, a question to be settled 
at the bar of human reason. I do not pretend to be 
better than they are. Probably I am a good deal 
worse than many of them, but that is not the ques- 
tion. The question is : " Bad as I am, have I the 
right to think ?" And I think I have for two reasons : 

First, I cannot help it. And secondly, I like it 

The whole question is right at a point. If I 
have not a right to express my thoughts, who has? 

"Oh," they say, "we will allow you to think, we 
will not burn you." 

" All right ; why won't you burn me?" 

" Because we think a decent man will allow 
others to think and to express his thought." 



16 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



" Then the reason you do not persecute me for 
my thought is that you believe it would be infamous 
in you ?" 

-Yes." 

" And yet you worship a God who will, as you 
declare, punish me forever?" 

Surely an infinite God ought to be as just as 
man. Surely no God can have the right to punish 
his children for being honest. He should not 
reward hypocrisy with heaven, and punish candor 
with eternal pain. 

The next question then is : Can I commit a sin 
against God by thinking ? If God did not intend I 
should think, why did he give me a thinker? For 
one, I am convinced, not only that I have the right 
to think, but that it is my duty to express my honest 
thoughts. Whatever tfre gods may say we must be 
true to ourselves. 

We have got what they call the Christian 
system of religion, and thousands of people won- 
der how I can be wicked enough to attack that 
system. 

There are many good things about it, and I shall 
never attack anything that I believe to be good ! I 
shall never fear to attack anything I honestly 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



17 



believe to be wrong ! We have what they call the 
Christian religion, and I find, just in proportion 
that nations have been religious, just in the pro- 
portion they have clung to the religion of their 
founders, they have gone back to barbarism. I 
find that Spain, Portugal, Italy, are the three worst 
nations in Europe. I find that the nation nearest 
infidel is the most prosperous — France. 

And so I say there can be no danger in the 
exercise of absolute intellectual freedom. I find 
among ourselves the men who think are at least 
as good as those who do not. 

We have, I say a Christian system, and that 
system is founded upon what they are pleased to 
call the "New Testament.'.' Who wrote the New 
Testament? I do not know. Who does know? 
Nobody. We have found many manuscripts con- 
taining portions of the New Testament. Some of 
these manuscripts leave out five or six books — 
many of them. Others more ; others less. No two 
of these manuscripts agree. Nobody knows who 
wrote these manuscripts. They are all written in 
Greek. The disciples of Christ, so far as we know, 
knew only Hebrew. Nobody ever saw, so far as 
we know, one of the original Hebrew manuscripts. 
2 



18 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



Nobody ever saw anybody who had seen anybody 
who had heard of anybody that had ever seen any- 
body that had ever seen one of the original Hebrew 
manuscripts. No doubt the clergy of your city 
have told you these facts thousands of times, and 
they will be obliged to me for having repeated 
them once more. These manuscripts are written 
in what are called capital Greek letters. They are 
called Uncial manuscripts, and the New Testament 
was not divided into chapters and verses, even, 
until the year of grace 1 55 1 . In the original the 
manuscripts and gospels are signed by nobody. 
The epistles are addressed to nobody ; and they are 
signed by the same person. All the addresses, all 
the pretended ear-marks showing to whom they 
were written, and by whom they were written, are 
simply interpolations, and everybody who has 
studied the subject knows it. 

It is further admitted that even these 
manuscripts have not been properly translated, and 
they have a syndicate now making a new 
translation ; and I suppose that I can not tell 
whether I really believe the New Testament or not 
until I see that new translation.. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



19 



You must remember, also, one other thing. 
Christ never wrote a solitary word of the New 
Testament — not one word. There is an account 
that he once stooped and wrote something in the 
sand, but that has not been preserved. He never 
told anybody to write a word. He never said : 
" Matthew, remember this. Mark, do not forget to 
put that down. Luke, be sure that in your gospel 
you have this. John, do not forget it." Not one 
word. And it has always seemed to me that a 
being coming from another world, with a message 
of infinite importance to mankind, should at least 
have verified that message by his own signature. 
Is it not wonderful that not one word was written 
by Christ? Is it not strange that he gave no 
orders to have his words preserved — words upon 
which hung the salvation of a world ? 

Why was nothing written ? I will tell you. In 
my judgment they expected the end of the world in 
a few days. That generation was not to pass away 
until the heavens should be rolled up as a scroll, 
and until the earth should melt with fervent heat. 
That was their belief. They believed that the 
world was to be destroyed, and that there was to 
be another coming, and that the saints were then to 



20 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



govern the earth. And they even went so far 
among the apostles, as we frequently do now before 
election, as to divide out the offices in advance. 
This Testament, as it now is, was not written for 
hundreds of years after the apostles were dust. 
Many of the pretended facts lived in the open 
mouth of credulity. They were in the waste- 
baskets of forgetfulness. They depended upon the 
inaccuracy of legend, and for centuries these 
doctrines and stories were blown about by the 
inconstant winds. And when reduced to writing, 
some gentleman would write by the side of the 
passage his idea of it, and the next copyist would 
put that in as a part of the text. And, when it was 
mostly written, and the church got into trouble, and 
wanted a passage to help it out, one was 
interpolated to order. So that now it is among the 
easiest things in the world to pick out at least one 
hundred interpolations in the Testament. And I 
will pick some of them out before I get through. 

And let me say here, once for all, that for the 
man Christ I have infinite respect. Let me say, 
once for all, that the place where man has died for 
man is holy ground, And let me say, once for all, 
that to that great and serene man I gladly pay, I 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



21 



gladly pay, the tribute of my admiration and my 
tears. He was a reformer in his day. He was an 
infidel in his time. He was regarded as a blas- 
phemer, and his life was destroyed by hypocrites, 
who have, in all ages, done what they could to 
trample freedom and manhood out of the human 
mind. Had I lived at that time I would have been 
his friend, and should he ccme again he will not find 
a better friend than I will be. 

That is for the man. For the theological 
creation I have a different feeling. If he was, in 
fact, God, he knew there was no such thing as 
death. He knew that what we called death was 
but the eternal opening of the golden gates of 
everlasting joy ; and it took no heroism to face a 
death that was eternal life. 

But when a man, when a poor boy sixteen 
years of age, goes upon the field of battle to keep 
his flag in heaven, not knowing but that death 
ends all ; not knowing but that when the shadows 
creep over him, the darkness will be eternal, there is 
heroism. For the man who, in the darkness, said : 
" My God, why hast thou forsaken me ?" — for that 
man I have nothing but respect, admiration, and 
love. Back of the theological shreds, rags, and 



22 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



patches, hiding the real Christ, I see a genuine 
man. 

A while ago I made up my mind to find out 
what was necessary for me to do in order to be 
saved. If I have got a soul, I want it saved. I 
do not wish to lose anything that is of value. 

For thousands of years the world has been 
asking that question : 

" What must we do to be saved ?" 

Saved from poverty ? No. Saved from crime ? 
No. Tyranny? No. But " What must we do to 
be saved from the eternal wrath of the God who 
made us all ?" 

If God made us, he will not destroy us. Infi- 
nite wisdom never made a poor investment. Upon 
all the works of an infinite God, a dividend must 
finally be declared. Why should God make fail- 
ures ? Why should he waste material ? Why 
should he not correct his mistakes, instead of 
damning them ? The pulpit has cast a shadow 
over even the cradle. The doctrine of endless 
punishment has covered the cheeks of this world 
with tears. I despise it, and I defy it. 

I made up my mind, I say, to see what I had to 
do in order to save my soul according to the 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



23 



Testament, and thereupon I read it. I read the 
gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and 
found that the church had been deceiving me. I 
found that the clergy did not understand their own 
book. I found that they had been building upon 
passages that had been -interpolated. I found that 
they had been building upon passages that were 
entirely untrue. And I will tell you why I think so. 



II. 



THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW. 
CCORDING to the church the first gospel 



L A. W as written by Matthew. As a matter of 
fact he never wrote a word of it — never saw h% 
never heard of it and probably never will. But for 
the purposes of this lecture I admit that he wrote 
it. I will admit that he was with Christ for three 
years ; that he was his constant companion ; that 
he shared his sorrows and his triumphs ; that he 
heard his words by the lonely lakes, the barren 
hills, in synagogue and street, and that he knew 
Jbis heart and became acquainted with his thoughts 
and aims. 

Now let us see what Matthew says we must do 
in order to be saved. And I take it that, if this 
is true, Matthew is as good authority as any minis- 
ter in the world. 




WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



25 



The first thing I find upon the subject of 
salvation is in the fifth chapter of Matthew, and is 
embraced in what is commonly known as the 
Sermon on the Mount. It is as follows : 

" Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the 
kingdom of heaven." Good! 

M Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain 
mercy." Good! Whether they belonged to any 
church or not ; whether they believed the bible or 
not? 

" Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain 
mercy." Good ! 

" Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall 
see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they 
shall be called the children of God. Blessed are 
they which are persecuted for righteousness sake," 
(that's me, a little !) " for theirs is the kingdom of 
Heaven." Good! 

In the same sermon he says : " Think not that 
I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I 
am not come to destroy, but to fulfill." And then 
he makes use of this remarkable language, almost 
as applicable to-day as it was then : "For I say 
unto you that except your righteousness shall 
exceed the righteousness of the scribes and 



26 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



Pharisees ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom 
of heaven." Good! 

In the sixth chapter I find the following, and it 
comes directly after the prayer known as the Lord's 
prayer : 

''For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your 
Heavenly Father will also forgive you ; but if ye 
forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your 
father forgive your trespasses." 

I accept the condition. There is an offer ; I 
accept it. If you will forgive men that trespass 
against you, God will forgive your trespasses 
against him. I accept the terms, and I never will 
ask any God to treat me better than I treat my 
fellow-men. There is a square promise. There is 
a contract. If you will forgive others God will 
forgive you. And it does not say you must 
believe in the Old Testament, or be baptized, or 
join the church, or keep Sunday ; that you must 
count beads, or pray, or become a nun, or a priest ; 
that you must preach sermons or hear them, build 
churches or fill them. Not one word is said about 
eating or fasting, denying or believing. It simply 
says, if you forgive others God will forgive you ; 
and it must of necessity be true. No god could 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



27 



afford to damn a forgiving man. Suppose God 
should damn to everlasting fire a man so great and 
good, that he, looking from the abyss of hell, 
would forgive God, — how would a god feel then? 

Now let me make myself plain upon one subject, 
perfectly plain. For instance, I hate Presbyterian- 
ism, but I know hundreds of splendid Presbyterians. 
Understand me. I hate Methodism, and yet I 
know hundreds of splendid Methodists. I hate 
Catholicism, and like Catholics. I hate insanity 
but not the insane. 

I do not war against men. I do not war against 
persons. I war against certain doctrines that I 
believe to be wrong. But I give to every other 
human being every right that I claim for myself. 

The next thing that I find is in the seventh 
chapter and the second verse : " For with what 
judgment t ye judge, ye shall be judged; and with 
what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you 
again." Good ! That suits me ! 

And in the twelfth chapter of Matthew : " For 
whosoever shall do the will of my Father that is 
in heaven, the same is my brother and sister and 
mother. For the son of man shall come in the 
glory of his father with his angels, and then he 



28 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



shall reward every man according ." To the 

church he belongs to? No. To the manner in 
which he was baptized ? No. According to his 
creed? No. " Then he shall reward every man 
according to his works." Good ! I subscribe to 
that doctrine. 

And in the sixteenth chapter: "And Jesus 
called a little child to him and stood him in the 
midst ; and said, 1 Verily I say unto you, except ye 
be converted and become as little children, ye shall 
not enter into the kingdom of heaven." I do not 
wonder that in his day, surrounded by scribes and 
Pharisees, he turned lovingly to little children. 

And yet, see what children the little children 
of God have been. What an interesting dimpled 
darling John Calvin was. Think of that prattling 
babe, Jonathan Edwards ! Think of the infants 
that founded the inquisition, that invented instru- 
ments of torture to tear human flesh. They were 
the ones who had become as little children. They 
were the children of faith. 

So I find in the nineteenth chapter : 11 And 
behold, one came and said unto him : ' Good 
master, what good thing shall I do that I may have 
eternal life ?" and he said unto him, 1 why call'st 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



29 



thou me good ? There is none good but one, and 
that is God, but if thou will enter into eternal life, 
keep the commandments,' and he said unto him 
which ?" 

Now, there is a fair issue. Here is a child of 
God asking God what is necessary for him to do 
in order to inherit eternal life. And God said to 
him : Keep the commandments. And the child 
said to the Almighty: " Which?" Now, if there 
ever has been an opportunity given to the Almighty 
to furnish a man of an inquiring mind with the 
necessary information upon that subject, here was 
the opportunity. " He said unto him, which ? And 
Jesus said : Thou shalt do no murder ; thou shalt 
not commit adultery ; thou shalt not steal ; thou 
shalt not bear false witness ; honor thy father and 
mother ; and thou shalt love thy neighbor as 
thyself." 

He did not say to him: "You must believe in 
me — that I am the only begotten son of the living 
God." He did not say : " You must be born 
again." He did not say : "You must believe the 
bible." He did not say: "You must remember 
the sabbath day, to keep it holy." He simply said : 
" Thou shalt do no murder. Thou shalt not com- 



.30 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



mit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt 
not bear false witness. Honor thy father and thy 
mother; and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thy- 
self." And thereupon the young man, who I think 
was mistaken, said unto him : " All these things 
have I kept from my youth up." 

What right has the church to add conditions of 
salvation ? Why should we suppose that Christ 
failed to tell the young man all that was necessary 
for him to do? Is it possible that he left out some 
important thing simply to mislead ? Will some 
minister tell us why he thinks that Christ kept back 
the " scheme" ? 

Now comes an interpolation. 

In the old times when the church got a little 
scarce of money, they always put in a passage 
praising poverty. So they had this young man 
ask : " What lack I yet ? And Jesus said unto 
him : If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou 
hast and give to the poor, and thou shalt have 
treasures in heaven." 

The church has always been willing to swap off 
treasures in heaven for cash down. And when the 
next verse was written the church must have been 
nearly bankrupt. " And again I say unto you, it is 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



31 



easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle 
than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of 
God." Did you ever know a wealthy disciple to 
unload on account of that verse ? 

And then comes another verse, which I believe 
is an interpolation: "And everyone that has 
forsaken houses, or brethren or sisters, or father or 
mother, or wife or children, or lands, for my name's 
sake, shall receive an hundred fold, and shall inherit 
everlasting life." 

Christ never said it. Never. " Whosoever 
shall forsake father and mother." 

Why he said to this man that asked him : 
4 What shall I do to inherit eternal life?" among 
other things, he said : " Honor thy father and 
thy mother." And we turn over the page and he 
says again : " If you will desert your father and 
mother you shall have everlasting life." It will not 
do. If you will desert your wife and your little 
children, or your lands — the idea of putting a house 
and lot on equality with wife and children ! Think 
of that ! I do not accept the terms. I will never 
desert the one I love for the promise of any god. 

It is far more important to love your wife than 
to love God, and I will tell you why. You cannot 



32 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



help him, but you can help her. You can fill her 
life with the perfume of perpetual joy. It is far 
more important that you love your children than 
that you love Jesus Christ. And why ? If he is 
God you cannot help him, but you can plant a little 
flower of happiness in every footstep of the child, 
from the cradle until you die in that child's arms. 
Let me tell you to-day it is far more important to 
build a home than to erect a church. The holiest 
temple beneath the stars is a home that love has 
built. And the holiest altar in all the wide world 
is the fireside around which gather father and 
mother and the sweet babes. 

There was a time when people believed the 
infamy commanded in this frightful passage. There 
was a time when they did desert fathers and 
mothers and wives and children. St. Augustine 
says to the devotee : Fly to the desert, and though 
your wife put her arms around your neck, tear her 
hands away ; she is a temptation of the devil. 
Though your father and mother throw their bodies 
athwart your threshold, step over them ; and though 
your children pursue, and with weeping eyes 
beseech you to return, listen not. It is the- 
temptation of the evil one. Fly to the desert and. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



33 



save your soul. Think of such a soul being worth 
saving. While I live I propose to stand by the 
ones I love. 

There is another condition of salvation. I find 
it in the twenty-fifth chapter: 4 'Then shall the 
King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye 
blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom pre- 
pared for you from the foundation of the world. 
For I was hungered and ye gave me meat ; I was 
thirsty and ye gave me drink ; I was a stranger and 
ye took me in ; I was naked and ye clothed me ; 
and I was sick and ye visited me ; and I was in 
prison and ye came unto me." Good ! 

I tell you to-night that God will not punish with 
eternal thirst the man who has put the cup of 
cold water to the lips of his neighbor. God will 
not leave in the eternal nakedness of pain the 
man who has clothed his fellow-men. 

For instance, here is a shipwreck, and here is 
some brave sailor who stands aside and allows a 
woman whom he never saw before to take his place 
in the boat, and he stands there, grand and serene 
as the wide sea, and he goes down/ Do you tell 
me that there is any God who will push the life- 
boat from the shore of eternal life, when that man 
3 



34 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



wishes to step in ? Do you tell me that God can 
be unpitying to the pitiful, that he can be unfor- 
giving to the forgiving ? I deny it ; and from the 
aspersions of the pulpit I seek to rescue the repu- 
tation of the Deity. 

Now I have read you substantially everything 
in Matthew on the subject of salvation. That is 
all there is. Not one word about believing any- 
thing. It is the gospel of deed, the gospel of 
charity, the gospel of self-denial ; and if only that 
gospel had been preached, persecution never would 
have shed one drop of blood. Not one. 

According to the testimony Matthew was well 
acquainted with Christ. According to the tes- 
timony, he had been with him, and his companion 
for years, and if it was necessary to believe any-, 
thing in order to get to heaven, Matthew should 
have told us. But he forgot it, or he did not 
believe it, or he never heard of it. You can 
, take your choice. 

In Matthew, we find that heaven is promised, 
first, to the poor in spirit. Second, to the 
merciful. Third, to the pure in heart. Fourth, 
to the peacemakers. Fifth, to those who are 
persecuted . for righteousness' . sake. Sixth, to 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



35 



those who keep and teach the commandments. 
Seventh, to those who forgive men that trespass 
against them. Eighth, that we will be judged as 
we judge others. Ninth, that they who receive 
prophets and righteous men shall receive a 
prophet's reward. Tenth, to those who do the 
will of God. Eleventh, that every man shall be 
rewarded according to his works. Twelfth, to 
those who become as little children. Thirteenth, 
to those who forgive the trespasses of others. 
Fourteenth, to the perfect : they who sell all 
that they have and give to the poor. Fifteenth, 
to them who forsake houses, and brethren, and 
sisters, and father, and mother, and wife, and 
children, and lands for the sake of Christ's name. 
Sixteenth, to those who feed the hungry, give 
drink to the thirsty, shelter to the stranger, 
clothes to the naked, comfort to the sick, and 
who visit the prisoner. 

Nothing else is said with regard to salvation 
in the gospel according to St. Matthew. Not 
one word about believing the Old Testament to 
have been inspired ; not one word about being 
baptized or joining a church ; not one word 
about believing in any miracle ; not even a hint 



36 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



that it was necessary to believe that Christ was 
the son of God, or that he did any wonderful or 
miraculous things, or that he was born of a 
virgin, or that his coming had been foretold by 
the Jewish prophets. Not one word about 
believing in the trinity, or in foreordination or 
predestination. Matthew had not understood from 
Christ that any such things were necessary to 
ensure the salvation of the soul. 

According . to the testimony, Matthew had 
been in the company of Christ, some say three 
years and some say one, but at least he had 
been with him long enough to find out some of 
his ideas upon this great subject. And yet 
Matthew never got the impression that it was 
necessary to believe something in order to get to 
heaven. He supposed that if a man forgave 
others God would forgive him ; he believed that 
God would show mercy to the merciful ; that he 
would not allow those who fed the hungry to 
starve ; that he would not put in the flames of 
hell those who had given cold water £o the thirsty ; 
that he would not cast into the eternal dungeon 
of his wrath those who had visited the 
imprisoned ; and that he would not damn men 
who forgave others. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



37 



Matthew had it in his mind that God would 
treat us very much as we treated other people ; 
and that in the next world he would treat with 
kindness those who had been loving and gentle 
in their lives. It may be the apostle was 
mistaken ; but evidently that was his opinion. 



lit 



THE GOSPEL OF MARK. 



LET us now see what Mark thought it necessary 
for a man to do to save his soul. In the 
fourth chapter, after Jesus had given to the multi- 
tude by the sea the parable of the sower, his disci- 
ples, when they were again alone, asked him the 
meaning of the parable. Jesus replied : 

" Unto you it is given to know the mystery of 
the kingdom of God : but unto them that are 
without, all these things are done in parables: 

" That seeing, they may see, and not perceive ; 
and hearing they may hear, and not understand ; 
lest at any time they should be converted, and 
their sins should be forgiven them." 

It is a little hard to understand why he should 
have preached to people that he did not intend 
should know his meaning. Neither is it quite clear 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED ? 



39 



why he objected to their being converted. This, I 
suppose, is one of the mysteries that we should 
simply believe without endeavoring to comprehend. 

With the above exception, and one other that I 
will mention hereafter, Mark substantially agrees 
with Matthew, that God will be merciful to the 
merciful, that he will be kind to the kind, that he 
will pity the pitying, and love the loving. Mark 
upholds the religion of Matthew until we come to 
the sixteenth verse of the sixteenth chapter, and 
then I strike an interpolation put in by hypocrisy, 
put in by priests who longed to grasp with bloody 
hands the sceptre of universal power. Let me 
read it to you. It is the most infamous passage in 
the bible. Christ never said it. No sensible man 
ever said it. 

" And He said unto them" (that is, unto his dis- 
ciples), " go ye into all the world and preach the 
Gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is 
baptized shall be saved ; but he that believeth not 
shall be damned." 

That passage was written so that fear would 
give alms to hypocrisy. Now, I propose to prove 
to you that this is an interpolation. How will I do 
it? In the first place, not one word is said about 



40 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



belief in Matthew. In the next place, not one word 
about belief in Mark until I come to that verse, and 
where is that said to have been spoken? Accord- 
ing to Mark, it is a part of the last conversation 
of Jesus Christ, — just before, according to the 
account, he ascended bodily before their eyes. If 
there ever was any important thing happened in this 
world that was it. If there is any conversation that 
people would be apt to recollect, it would be the last 
conversation with a god before he rose visibly 
through the air and seated himself upon the throne 
of the infinite. We have in this Testament five 
accounts of the last conversation happening between 
Jesus Christ and his apostles. Matthew gives it, 
and yet Matthew does not state that in that conver- 
sation Christ said: " Who so believeth and is 
baptized shall be saved, and whoso believeth not 
shall be damned. " And if he did say those words 
they were the most important that ever fell from 
lips. Matthew did not hear it, or did not believe 
it, or forgot it. 

Then I turn to Luke, and he gives an account 
of this same last conversation, and not one word 
does he say upon that subject. Luke does not 
pretend that Christ said that whoso believeth not 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



41 



shall be damned. Luke certainly did not hear it. 
May be he forgot it. Perhaps he did not think 
that it was worth recording. Now it is the most 
important thing, if Christ said it, that he ever said. 

Then I turn to John, and he gives an account of 
the last conversation, but not one solitary word on 
the subject of belief or unbelief. Not one solitary 
word on the subject of damnation. Not one. 
John might not have been listening. 

Then I turn to the first chapter of the Acts, and 
there I find an account of the last conversation ; 
and in that conversation there is not one word upon 
this subject. This is a demonstration that the pas- 
sage in Mark is an interpolation. What other 
reason have I got ? There is not one particle of 
sense in it. Why ? No man can control his belief. 
You hear evidence for and against, and the integrity 
of the soul stands at the scales and tells which side 
rises and which side falls. You can not believe as 
you wish. You must believe as you must. And 
he might as well have said : " Go into the world 
and preach the gospel, and whosoever has red hair 
shall be saved, and whosoever hath not shall be 
damned.' 1 



42 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



I have another reason. I am much obliged to 
the gentleman who interpolated these passages. I 
am much obliged to him that he put in some more 
— two more. Now hear : 

" And these signs shall follow them that 
believe." Goodf 

" In my name shall they cast out devils. They 
shall speak with new tongues, and they shall take 
up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing it 
shall not hurt them. They shall lay hands on the 
sick and they shall recover/ ' 

Bring on your believer ! Let him cast out a devil. 
I do not ask for a large one. Just a " little one for 
a cent." Let him take up serpents. <l And if he 
drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt him." Let 
me mix up a dose for the believer, and if it does 
not hurt him I will join a church. <c Oh ! but," 
they say, " those things only lasted through the 
Apostolic age." Let us see. " Go into all the 
world and preach the gospel, and whosoever be- 
lieves and is baptized shall be saved, and these 
signs shall follow them that believe." 

How long ? I think at least until they had gone 
into all the world. Certainly those signs should 
follow until all the world had been visited. And 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



43 



yet if that declaration was in the mouth of Christ, 
he then knew that one-half of the world was 
unknown, and that he would be dead fourteen 
hundred and fifty-nine years before his disciples 
would know that there was another continent. And 
yet he said, "Go into all the world and preach the 
gospel/' and he knew then that it would be four- 
teen hundred and fifty-nine years before anybody 
could go. Well, if it was worth while to have signs 
follow believers in the Old World, surely it was 
worth while to have signs follow believers in the 
New. And the very reason that signs should 
follow would be to convince the unbeliever, and 
there are as many unbelievers now as ever, and the 
signs are as necessary to-day as they ever were. I 
would like a few myself. 

This frightful declaration, " He that believeth 
and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth 
not shall be damned," has filled the world with 
agony and crime. Every letter of this passage has 
been sword and fagot ; every word has been 
dungeon and chain. That passage made the sword 
of persecution drip with innocent blood through 
centuries of agony and crime. That passage made 
the horizon of a thousand years lurid with the fagot's 



44 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



flames. That passage contradicts the sermon on* 
the mount ; travesties the Lord's prayer ; turns the 
splendid religion of deed and duty into the - 
superstition of creed and cruelty. I deny it. It is 
infamous ! Christ never said it ! 



IV. 



THE GOSPEL OF LUKE. 

IT is sufficient to say that Luke agrees substan- 
tially with Matthew and Mark. 
" Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father is also 
merciful." Good ! 

"Judge not and ye shall not be judged. 
Condemn not and ye shall not be condemned ; 
forgive and ye shall be forgiven." Good ! 

4 4 Give and it shall be given unto you good 
measure, pressed down, shaken together, running 
over." Good ! I like it. 

" For the same measure that ye mete withal it 
shali be measured to you again." 

He agrees substantially with Mark ; he agrees 
substantially with Matthew ; and I come at last 
to the nineteenth chapter. 



46 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



" And Zaccheus stood and said unto the Lord, 
' Behold, Lord, the one-half of my goods I give to 
the poor, and if I have taken anything from any 
man by false accusation, I restore him four fold.' 
And Jesus said unto him, ' this day is salvation 
come to this house.'" 

That is good doctrine. He did not ask Zaccheus 
what he believed. He did not ask him, " Do you 
believe in the bible ? Do you believe in the five 
points ? Have you ever been baptized — 
sprinkled? Oh! immersed? " Half of my goods I 
give to the poor, and if I have taken anything from 
any man by false accusation, I restore him four 
fold." " And Christ said, this day is salvation 
come to this house." Good ! 

I read also in Luke that Christ when upon the 
cross forgave his murderers, and that is considered 
the shining gem in the crown of his mercy. He 
forgave his murderers. He forgave the men who 
drove the nails in his hands, in his feet, that 
plunged a spear in his side ; the soldier that in the 
hour of death offered him in mockery the bitterness 
to drink. He forgave them all freely, and yet, 
although he would forgive them, he will in the 
nineteenth century, as we are told by the orthodox 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



47 



church, damn to eternal fire a noble man for the 
expression of his honest thoughts. That will not 
do. I find, too, in Luke, an account of two thieves 
that were crucified at the same time. The other 
gospels speak of them. One says they both railed 
upon him. Another says nothing about it. In 
Luke we are told that one railed upon him, but one 
of the thieves looked and pitied Christ, and Christ 
said to that thief: 

" To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise." 

Why did he say that ? Because the thief pitied 
him. God can not afford to trarnple beneath .the. > 
feet of. his infinite wrath the smallest blossom of 
pity that ever shed its perfume in the human heart! 

Who was this thief? To what church did he 
belong ? I do not know. The fact that he was a 
thief throws no light on that question. Who was - 
he ? What did he believe ? I do not know. Did 
he believe in the Old Testament ? In the miracles ? 
I do not know. Did he believe that Christ was' 
God ? I do not know. Why then was the promise, 
made to him that he should meet Christ in 
paradise? Simply because he pitied suffering 
innocence upon the cross. 

God can not afford to damn any man that is. 
capable of pitying anybody. 



V. 



THE GOSPEL OF JOHN. 

AND now we come to John, and that is where 
the trouble commences. 
The other gospels teach that God will be 
merciful to the merciful, forgiving to the forgiving, 
kind to the kind, loving to the loving, just to the 
just, merciful to the good. 

Now we come to John, and here is another 
doctrine. And allow me to say that John was not 
written until long after the others. John was 
mostly written by the church. 

" And Jesus answered and said unto him : 
11 Furthermore I say unto thee that except a man be 
born again he can not see the kingdom of God." 

Why did he not tell Matthew that ? Why did 
he not tell Luke that ? Why did he not tell Mark 
that ? They never heard of it, or forgot it, or they 
did not believe it. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



49 



" Except a man be born of water and of the 
Spirit he can not enter into the kingdom of God." 
Why? 

" That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and 
that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel 
not that I said unto thee, ' ye must be born again.' 
That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that 
which is born of the spirit is spirit," and he might 
have added, that which is born of water is water. 

" Marvel not that I said unto thee, 1 ye must be 
born again.' " And then the reason is given, and I 
admit I did not understand it myself until I read the 
reason, and when you hear the reason, you will 
understand it as well as I do ; and here it is : " The 
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the 
sound thereof, and canst not tell whence it cometh, 
and whither it goeth." So, I find in the book of 
John the idea of the Real Presence. 

"And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wil- 
derness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, 

14 That whosoever belie veth in him should not 
perish, but have eternal life. 

" For God so loved the world that he gave his 

only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him 

should not perish but have everlasting life. 
4 



50 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



" For God sent not his Son into the world to 
condemn the world, but that the world through him 
might be saved. 

"He that believeth on him is not condemned ; 
but he that believeth not is condemned already, 
because he hath not believed in the name of the 
only begotten Son of God. 

" He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting 
life : and he that believeth not the Son, shall not 
see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." 

" Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth 
my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath 
everlasting life, and shall not come into condemna- 
tion ; but is passed from death unto life. 

"Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is 
coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the 
voice of the Son of God ; and they that hear shall 
live, 

"And shall come forth; they that have done 
good unto the resurrection of life ; and they that 
have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation." 

" And this is the will of him that sent me, that 
everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth on 
him, may have everlasting life ; and I will raise 
him up at the last day,. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



5i 



" No man can come to me, except my Father, 
which hath sent me, draw him; and I will raise 
him up at the last day. 

"Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth 
on me hath everlasting life. 

" I am that bread of life. 

"Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, 
and are dead. 

"This is the bread which cometh down from 
heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. 

" I am the living bread which came down from 
heaven. If any man eat of this bread he shall live 
forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh, 
which I will give for the life of the world. 

"Then Jesus said unto them, verily, verily,,. I 
say unto you, except ye eat of the flesh of the Son 
of man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. 

"Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my 
blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at 
the last day. 

" For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is 
drink indeed. 

" He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my 
blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. 



52 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



" As the living Father hath sent me, and I live 
by the Father; so he that eateth me, even he shall 
live by me. 

"This is that bread which came down from 
heaven; not as your fathers did eat manna, and 
are dead ; he that eateth of this bread shall live 
forever. 

"And he said, therefore said I unto you, that 
no man can come unto me, except it were given 
unto him of my Father." 

"Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and 
the life ; he that believeth in me, though he were 
dead, yet shall he live. 

"And whosoever liveth and believeth in me, 
shall never die." 

" He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he 
that hateth his life in this world, shall keep it unto 
life eternal." 

So I find in the book of John, that in order to be 
saved we must not only believe in Jesus Christ, but 
we must eat of the flesh and we must drink of the 
blood of Jesus Christ. If that gospel is true, the 
Catholic church is right. But it is not true. I can 
not believe it, and yet for all that, it may be true. 
But I do not believe it. Neither do I believe there 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 53 



is any god in the universe who will damn a man 
simply for expressing his belief. 

" Why," they say to me, " suppose all this 
should turn out to be true, and you should come to 
the day of judgment and find all these things to be 
true. What would you do then?" I would walk 
up like a man, and say, " I was mistaken." 

" And suppose God was about to pass judgment 
upon you, what would you say ?" I would say to 
him, " Do unto others as you would that others 
should do unto you." Why not? 

I am told that I must render good for evil. I 
am told that if smitten on one cheek I must turn the 
other. I am told that I must overcome evil with 
good. I am told that I must love my enemies ; 
and will it do for this God who tells me to love my 
enemies to damn his ? No, it will not do. It will 
not do. 

In the book of John all these doctrines of 
regeneration — that it is necessary to believe in the 
Lord Jesus Christ ; that salvation depends upon 
belief — in this book of John all these doctrines find 
their warrant ; nowhere else. 

Read Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and then read 
John, and you will agree with me that the three 



54 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



first gospels teach that if we are kind and forgiving 
to our fellows, God will be kind and forgiving to us. 
In John we are told that another man can be good 
for us, or bad for us, and that the only way to get 
to heaven is to believe something that we know is 
pot so. 

All these passages about believing in Christ, 
drinking his blood and eating his flesh, are after- 
thoughts. They were written by the theologians, 
and in a few years they will be discovered as un- 
worthy of the lips of Christ. 



VI. 



THE CATHOLICS. 



NOW ' upon these gospels that I have read 
the churches rest; and out of these things, 
mistakes and interpolations, they have made their 
creeds. And the first church to make a creed, 
so far as I know, was the Catholic. It was the first 
church that had any power. That is the church 
that has preserved all these miracles for us. That 
is the church that preserved the manuscripts for us. 
That is the church whose word we have to take. 
That church is the first witness that Protestantism 
brought to the bar of history to prove miracles that 
took place eighteen hundred years ago ; and while 
the witness is there Protestantism takes pains to 
say : " You cannot believe one word that witness 
says, now/' 



56 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



That church is the only one that keeps up a 
constant communication with heaven through the 
instrumentality of a large number of decayed saints. 
That church has an agent of God on earth, has a 
person who stands in the place of deity ; and that 
church is infallible. That church has persecuted to 
the exact extent of her power — and always will. 
In Spain that church stands erect, and is arrogant. 
In the United States that church crawls : but the 
object in both countries is the same — and that is 
the destruction of intellectual liberty. That church 
teaches us that we can make God happy by being 
miserable ourselves ; that a nun is holier in the 
sight of God than a loving mother with her child in 
her thrilled and thrilling arms ; that a priest is better 
than a father ; that celibacy is better than that 
passion of love that has made everything of beauty 
in this world. That church tells the girl of sixteen 
or eighteen years of age, with eyes like dew and 
light; that girl with the red of health in the white 
of her beautiful cheeks — tells that girl, " Put on 
the veil, woven of death and night, kneel upon 
stones, and you will please God." 

I tell you that, by law, no girl should be allowed 
to take the veil and renounce the joys and beau- 
ties of this life. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



57 



I am opposed to allowing these spider-like priests 
to weave webs to catch the loving maidens of the 
world. There ought to be a law appointing com- 
missioners to visit such places twice a year and 
release every person who expresses a desire 
to be released. I do not believe in keeping the 
penitentiaries of God. No doubt they are honest 
about it. That is not the question. These igno- 
rant superstitions fill millions of lives with weari- 
ness and pain, with agony and tears. 

This church, -after a few centuries of thought, 
made a creed, and that creed is the foundation of 
the orthodox religion. Let me read it to you : 

"Whosoever will be saved, before all things it 
is necessary that he hold the Catholic faith ; which 
faith except every one do keep entire and inviolate, 
without doubt, he shall everlastingly perish." Now 
the faith is this: "That we worship one God in 
trinity and trinity in unity." 

Of course you understand how that is done, 
and there is no need of my explaining it. " Neither 
confounding the persons nor dividing the sub- 
stance." You see what a predicament that would 
leave the deity in if you divided the substance. 



58 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED* 



"For one is the person of the Father, another 
of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost ; but 
the Godhead of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
the Holy Ghost is all one" — you know what I 
mean by Godhead. " In glory equal, and in 
majesty coeternal. Such as the Father is, such is 
the Son, such is the Holy Ghost. The Father is 
uncreated, the Son uncreated, the Holy Ghost un- 
created. The Father incomprehensible, the Son 
incomprehensible, the Holy Ghost incomprehen- 
sible. " And that is the reason we know so much 
about the thing. "The Father is eternal, the Son 
eternal, the Holy Ghost eternal, and yet there 
are not three eternals, only one eternal, as also 
there are not three uncreated, nor three incom- 
prehensibles, only one uncreated, one incompre- 
hensible." 

" In like manner, the Father is almighty, the 
Son almighty, the Holy Ghost almighty. Yet 
there are not three almighties, only one Almighty. 
So the Father is God, the Son God, the Holy 
Ghost God, and yet not three Gods ; and so, 
likewise, the Father is Lord, the Son is Lord, the 
Holy Ghost is Lord, yet there are not three 
Lords, for as we are compelled by the Christian 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 59 



truth to acknowledge every person by himself to 
be God and Lord, so we are all forbidden by the 
Catholic religion to say there are three Gods, or 
three Lords. The Father is made of no one ; not 
created or begotten. The Son is from the Father 
alone, not made, not created, or begotten. The 
Holy Ghost is from the Father and the Son, not 
made nor begotten, but proceeding." 

You know what proceeding is. 

" So there is one Father, not three Fathers." 
Why should there be three fathers, and only one 
Son? " One Son, and not three Sons; one Holy 
Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts ; and in this Trinity 
there is nothing before or afterward, nothing 
greater or less, but the whole three persons are 
coeternal with one another and coequal, so that 
in all things the unity is to be worshiped in 
Trinity, and the Trinity is to be worshiped in 
unity. Those who will be saved must thus think 
of the Trinity. Furthermore, it is necessary to 
everlasting salvation that he also believe rightly 
the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now 
the right of this thing is this : That we believe 
and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of 
God, is both God and man. He is God of the 



60 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



substance of his Father begotten before the world 
was." 

That was a good while before his mother lived. 

" And he is man of the substance of his 
mother, born in this world, perfect God and 
perfect man, and the rational soul in human flesh, 
subsisting equal to the Father according to his 
Godhead, but less than the Father according to 
his manhood, who being both God and man is not- 
two but one, one not by conversion of God into 
flesh, but by the taking of the manhood into God." 

You see that is a great deal easier than the 
other way would be. 

" One altogether, not by a confusion of sub- 
stance but by unity of person, for as the rational - 
soul and the flesh is one man, so God and man is 
one Christ, who suffered for our salvation, de- 
scended into hell, rose again the third day from 
the dead, ascended into heaven, and he sitteth at . 
the right hand of God, the Father Almighty, and 
He shall come to judge the living and the dead." ; 

In order to be saved it is necessary to believe 
this. What a blessing that we do not have to 
understand it. And in order to compel the human 
intellect to get upon its knees before that infinite v 
absurdity, thousands and millions have suffered 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



61 



agonies ; thousands and thousands haye perished in 
dungeons and in fire ; and if all the bones of all 
{the victims of the Catholic church could be 
gathered together, a monument higher than all the 
pyramids would rise, in the presence of which the 
eyes even of priests would be wet with tears. 

That church covered Europe with cathedrals 
and dungeons, and robbed men of the jewel of the 
soul. That church had ignorance upon its knees. 
That church went in partnership with the tyrants 
of the throne, and between those two vultures, the 
altar and the throne, the heart of man was 
devoured. 

Of course I have met, and cheerfully admit 
that there are thousands of good Catholics; but 
Catholicism is contrary to human liberty. Cathol- 
icism bases salvation upon belief. Catholicism 
teaches man to trample his reason under foot. 
And for that reason it is wrong. 

Thousands of volumes could not contain the 
crimes of the Catholic church. They could not 
contain even the names of her victims. With 
sword and fire, with rack and chain, with dungeon 
and whip she endeavored to convert the world. 
In weakness a beggar — in power a highwayman,— 
alms dish or dagger — tramp or tyrant. 



VII. 



THE EPISCOPALIANS. 



HE next church I wish to speak of is the 



Episcopalian. That was founded by Henry 
VIII, now in heaven. He cast off Queen Catherine 
and Catholicism together, and he accepted Episco- 
palianism and Annie Boleyn at the same time. That 
church, if it had a few more ceremonies, would be 
Catholic. If it had a few less, nothing. We 
have an Episcopalian church in this country, and 
it has all the imperfections of a poor relation. It 
is always boasting of its rich relative. In England 
the creed is made by law, the same as we pass 
statutes here. And when a gentleman dies in 
England, in order to determine whether he shall 
be saved or not, it is necessary for the power of 
heaven to read the acts of parliament. It becomes 




WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



a question of law, and sometimes a man is 
damned on a very nice point. Lost on demurrer. 

A few years ago, a gentleman by the name of 
Seabury, Samuel Seabury, was sent over to 
England to get some apostolic succession. We 
had not a drop in the house. It was necessary for 
the bishops of the English church to put their 
hands upon his head. They refused. There was 
no act of parliament justifying it. He had then to 
go to the Scotch bishops ; and, had the Scotch 
bishops refused, we never would have had any 
apostolic succession in the New World, and God 
would have been driven out of half the earth, and 
the true church never could have been founded 
upon this continent. But the Scotch bishops put 
their hands on his head, and now we have an 
unbroken succession of heads and hands from St. 
Paul to the last bishop. 

In this country the Episcopalians have done 
some good, and I want to thank that church. 
Having on an average less religion than the others 
— on an average you have done more good to 
mankind. You preserved some of the humanities. 
You did not hate music; you did not absolutely 
despise painting, and you did not altogether abhor 



64 WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 

. f _ 

architecture, and you finally admitted that it was 

no worse to keep time with your feet than with 

your hands. And some went so far as to say that 

people could play cards, and that God would 

overlook it, or would look the other way. For all 

these things accept my thanks. 

When I was a boy, the other churches looked 

upon dancing as probably the mysterious sin 

against the Holy Ghost; and they used to teach 

that when four boys got in a hay-mow, playing 

seven-up, that the eternal God stood whetting the 

sword of his eternal wrath waiting to strike them 

down to the lowest hell. That church has done 

some good. 

The Episcopal creed is substantially like the 
Catholic, containing a few additional absurdities. 
The Episcopalians teach that it is easier to get 
forgiveness for sin after you have been baptized. 
They seem to think that the moment you are 
baptized you become a member of the firm, and as 
such are entitled to wickedness at cost. This 
church is utterly unsuited to a free people. Its 
government is tyrannical, supercilious and absurd. 
Bishops talk as though they were responsible for 
the souls in their- charge. They wear vests that 



WHAT MUST WE BO TO BE SAVED f 



65 



button on one side. Nothing is so essential to the 
clergy of this denomination as a good voice. The 
Episcopalians have persecuted just to the extent of 
their power. Their treatment of the Irish has 
been a crime — a crime lasting for three hundred 
years. That church persecuted the Puritans of 
England and the Presbyterians of Scotland. In 
England the altar is the mistress of the throne, and 
this mistress has always looked at honest wives 
with scorn. 



5 



VIII. 



THE METHODISTS. 



BOUT a hundred and fifty years ago, two 



men, John Wesley and George Whitfield, 
said, If everybody is going to hell, somebody 
ought to mention it. The Episcopal clergy said : 
Keep still ; do not tear your gown. Wesley and 
Whitfield said : This frightful truth ought to be 
proclaimed from the housetop of every opportu- 
nity, from the highway of every occasion. They 
were good, honest men. They believed their doc- 
trine. And they said: If there is a- hell, and a 
Niagara of souls pouring over an eternal precipice 
of ignorance, somebody ought to say something. 
They were right ; somebody ought, if such a thing 
is true. Wesley was a believer in the bible. He 
believed in the actual presence of the Almighty. 




WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



67 



God used to do miracles for him ; used to put off a 
rain several days to give his meeting a chance; 
used to cure his horse of lameness ; used to cure 
Mr. Wesley's headaches. 

And Mr. Wesley also believed in the actual 
existence of the devil. He believed that devils 
had possession of people. He talked to the devil 
when he was in folks, and the devil told him that 
he was going to leave ; and that he was going into 
another person. That he would be there at a 
certain time ; and Wesley went to that other per- 
son, and there the devil was, prompt to the minute. 
He regarded every conversion as warfare between 
God and this devil for the possession of that 
human soul, and that in the warfare God had 
gained the victory. Honest, no doubt. Mr. Wes- 
ley did not believe in human liberty. Honest, 
no doubt. Was opposed to the liberty of the 
Colonies. Honestly so. Mr. Wesley preached a 
sermon entitled: "The Cause and Cure of Earth- 
quakes," in which he took the ground that earth- 
quakes were caused by sin ; and the only way to 
stop them was to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. 
No doubt an honest man. 



68 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



Wesley and Whitfield fell out on the question 
of predestination. Wesley insisted that God in- 
vited everybody to the feast. Whitfield said he 
did not invite those he knew would not come. 
Wesley said he did. Whitfield said: Well, he did 
not put plates for them, anyway. Wesley said 
he did. So that, when they were in hell he could 
show them that there was a seat left for them. 
The church that they founded is still active. And 
probably no church in the world has done so much 
preaching for as little money as the Methodists. 
Whitfield believed in slavery, and advocated the 
slave trade. And it was of Whitfield that Whittier 
made the two lines : 

He bade the slave ships speed from coast to coast, 
Fanned by the wings of the Holy Ghost. 

We have lately had a meeting of the Metho- 
dists, and I find, by their statistics that they believe 
that they have converted 130,000 folks in a year. 
That, in order to do this, they have 26,000 preach- 
ers, 226,000 Sunday-school scholars, and about 
$100,000,000 investe4 in church property. I find, 
in looking over the history of the world, that 
there are 40,000,000 or 50,000,000 of peop 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



born a year, and if they are saved at the rate of 
130,000 a year, about how long will it take that 
doctrine to save this world ? Good, honest people ; 
but they are mistaken. 

In old times they were very simple. Churches 
used to be like barns. They used to have them 
divided — men on that side, and women on this. 
A little barbarous. We have advanced since then, 
and we now find as a fact, demonstrated by 
experience, that a man sitting by the woman he 
loves can thank God as heartily as though sitting 
between two men that he has never been intro- 
duced to. 

There is another thing the Methodists should 
remember, and that is that the Episcopalians were 
the greatest enemies they ever had. And they 
should remember that the Free-Thinkers have 
always treated them kindly and well. 

There is one thing about the Methodist church 
in the North that I like. But I find that it is not 
Methodism that does that. I find that the Metho- 
dist church in the South is as much opposed 
to liberty as the Methodist church North is in favor 
of liberty. So it is not Methodism that is in 
favor of liberty or slavery. They differ a little in 



70 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



their creed from the rest. They do not believe that 
God does everything. They believe that he does 
his part, and that you must do the rest, and that 
getting to heaven is a partnership business. The 
Methodist church is adapted to new countries — 
its ministers are generally uncultured, and with 
them zeal takes the place of knowledge. They 
convert people with noise. In the silence that 
follows most of the converts backslide. 

In a little while a struggle will commence 
between the few who are growing and the ortho- 
dox many. The few will be driven out, and the 
church will be governed by those who believe 
without understanding. 



IX. 



THE PRESBYTERIANS. 



HE next church is the Presbyterian, and in my 



judgment the worst of all, as far as creed is con- 
cerned. This church was founded by John Calvin, 
a murderer ! 

John Calvin, having power in Geneva, inaugu- 
rated human torture. Voltaire abolished torture 
in France. The man who abolished torture, if the 
Christian religion be true, God is now torturing in 
hell, and the man who inaugurated torture, is now 
a glorified angel in heaven. It will not do. 

John Knox started this doctrine in Scotland, and 
there is this peculiarity about Presbyterianism — - 
it grows best where the soil is poorest. I read the 
other day an account of a meeting between John 
Knox and John Calvin. Imagine a dialogue 




72 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



between a pestilence and a famine ! Imagine a 
conversation between a block and an ax ! As I 
read their conversation it seemed to me as though 
John Knox and John Calvin were made for each 
other ; that they fitted each other like the upper 
and lower jaws of a wild beast. They believed 
happiness was a crime ; they looked upon laughter 
as blasphemy; and they did all they could to 
destroy every human feeling, and to fill the mind 
with the infinite gloom of predestination and 
eternal death. They taught the doctrine that God 
had a right to damn us because he made us. 
That is just the reason that he has not a right to 
damn us. There is s,ome dust. Unconscious dust ! 
What right has God to change that unconscious 
dust into a human being, when he knows that 
human being will sin ; when he knows that human 
being will suffer eternal agony ? Why not leave 
him in the unconscious dust ? What right has an 
infinite God to add to the sum of human agony ? 
Suppose I knew that I could change that piece 
of furniture into a living, sentient human being, 
and I knew that that being would suffer untold 
agony forever. If I did it, I would be. a fiend. I 
would leave that being in the unconscious dust. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



73 



And yet we are told that we must believe such a 
doctrine or we are to be eternally damned ! It 
will not do. 

In 1839 there was a division in this church, and 
they had a lawsuit to see which was the church of 
God. And they tried it by a judge and jury, and 
the jury decided that the new school was the 
church of God, and then they got a new trial, and 
the next jury decided that the old school was the 
church of God, and that settled it. That church 
teaches that infinite innocence was sacrificed for 
me ! I do not want it ! I do not wish to go to 
heaven unless I can settle by the books, and go 
there because I ought to go there. I have said, 
and I say again, I do not wish to be a charity 
angel. I have no ambition to become a winged 
pauper of the skies. 

The other day a young gentleman, a Presby- 
terian who had just been converted, came- to me 
and he gave me a tract, and he told me he was 
perfectly happy. Said I, "Do you think a great 
many people are going to hell?" ""Oh, yes." 
"And you are perfectly happy?" "Well, he did 
not know as he was, quite." "Would not you be 
happier if they were all going to heaven?" "Oh, 



74 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



yes." "Well, then, you are not perfectly happy?" 
"No, he did not think he was." "When you get 
to heaven, then you will be perfectly happy?" 
"Oh, yes." "Now, when we are only going to 
hell, you are not quite happy; but when we are in 
hell, and you in heaven, then you will be perfectly 
happy? You will not be as decent when you get 
to be an angel as you are now, will you ? " " Well," 
he said, "that was not exactly it." Said I, "Sup- 
pose your mother were in hell, would you be happy 
in heaven then?" "Well," he says, "I suppose 
God would know the best place for mother." And 
I thought to myself, then, if i was a woman, I 
would like to have five or six boys like that. 

It will not do. Heaven is where those are we 
love, and those who love us. And I wish to go to 
no world unless I can be accompanied by those 
who love me here. Talk about the consolations 
of this infamous doctrine. The consolations of a 
doctrine that makes a father say, " I can be 
happy with my daughter in hell;" that makes a 
mother say,' "I can be happy with my generous, 
brave boy in hell;" that makes a boy say, "I can 
enjoy the glory of heaven with the woman who 
bore me, the worrian who would have died for me, 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 75 



in eternal agony." And they call that tidings of 
great joy. 

No church has done more to fill the world with 
gloom than the Presbyterian. Its creed is frightful, 
hideous, and hellish. The Presbyterian god is- the 
monster of monsters. He is an eternal execu- 
tioner, jailer and turnkey. He will enjoy forever 
the shrieks of the lost, — the wails of the damned. 
Hell is the festival of the Presbyterian god. 



X. 



THE EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE. 



1HAVE not time to speak of the Baptists, — 
that Jeremy Taylor said were as much to be 
rooted out as anything that is the greatest pest 
and nuisance on the earth. He hated the Baptists 
because they represented, in some little degree, 
the liberty of thought. Nor have I time to speak 
of the Quakers, the best of all, and abused by all. 
I cannot forget that John Fox, in the year of grace 
1640, was put in the pillory and whipped from 
town to town, scarred, put in a dungeon, beaten, 
trampled upon, and what for ? Simply because he 
preached the doctrine: "Thou shalt not resist 
evil with evil." "Thou shalt love thy enemies." 
Think of what the church must have been that 
day to scar the- flesh of that loving man ! Just 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



77 



4 think of it ? I say I have not time to speak of all 
these sects — the varieties of Presbyterians and 
T Campbellites. There are hundreds and hundreds 
i of these sects, all founded upon this creed that I 
' read, differing simply in degree. 

Ah ! but they say to me : You are fighting 
f something that is dead. Nobody believes this 
now. The preachers do not believe' what they 
preach in the pulpit. The people in the pews do 
not "believe what they hear preached. And they 
say to me : You are fighting something that is dead. 
This is all a form, we do not believe a solitary 
creed in the world. We sign them and swear that 
we believe them, but we do not. And none of us 
do. And all the ministers, they say in private, 
' admit that they do not believe it, not quite. I do 
I not know whether this is so or not. I take it that 
! they believe what they preach. I take it that 
when they meet and solemnly agree to a creed, 
I that they are honest and really believe in that 
s i creed. But let us see if I am waging a war 
\ against the ideas of the dead. Let us see if I am 
" simply storming a cemetery. 

X The Evangelical Alliance, made up of all ortho- 
5 t dox denominations of the world, met only a few 



78 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



years ago, and here is their creed: They believe 
in the divine inspiration, authority and sufficiency 
of the holy scriptures ; the right and duty of 
private judgment in the interpretation of the holy 
scriptures, but if you interpret wrong you are 
damned. They believe in the unity of the god- 
head and the trinity of the persons therein. They 
believe in the utter depravity of human nature. 
There can be no more infamous doctrine than that. 
They look upon a little child as a lump of depra- 
vity. I look upon it as a bud of humanity, that 
will, in the air and light of love and joy, blossom 
into rich and glorious life. 

Total depravity of human nature ! Here is a 
woman whose husband has been lost at sea; the 
news comes that he has been drowned by the 
ever-hungry waves, and she waits. There is 
something in her heart that tells her he is alive. 
And she waits. And years afterward as she looks 
down toward the little gate she sees him ; he has 
been given back by the sea, and she rushes to 
his arms, and covers his face with kisses and 
with tears. And if that infamous doctrine is true 
every tear is a crime, and every kiss a blasphemy. 
It will not do. According to that doctrine, if a 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED f 



7>> 



man steals and repents, and takes back the 
property, the repentance and the taking back of 
the property are two other crimes. It is an infamy. 
What else do they believe? "The justification of 
a sinner by faith alone," without works — just 
faith. Believing something that you do not under- 
stand. Of course God can not afford to reward a 
man for believing anything that is reasonable. 
God rewards only for believing something that is 
unreasonable. If you believe something that is 
improbable and unreasonable, you are a Christian ; 
but if you believe something that you know is not 
so, then, — you are a saint. 

They believe in the eternal blessedness of the 
righteous, and in the eternal punishment of the 
wicked. 

Tidings of great joy ! They are so good that 
they will not associate with Universalists. They 
will not associate with Unitarians ; they will not 
associate with scientists ; they will only associate 
with those who believe that God so loved the 
world that he made up his mind to damn the most 
of us. 

The Evangelical Alliance reiterates the absurd- 
ities of the Dark Ages — repeats the five points of 



80 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



Calvin — replenishes the fires of hell — certifies to 
the mistakes and miracles of the bible — maligns 
the human race, and kneels to a god who accepted 
the agony of the innocent as an atonement for the 
guilty. 



XL 

WHAT DO YOU PROPOSE? 

THEN they say to me: 1 ' What do you propose? 
You have torn this down, what do you 
propose to give us in place of it?" I have not 
torn the good down. I have only endeavored to 
trample out the ignorant, cruel fires of hell. I 
do not tear away the passage: "God will be 
merciful to the merciful." I do not destroy the 
promise; "If you will forgive others, God will 
forgive you." I would not for anything blot out 
the faintest star that shines in the horizon of human 
despair, nor in the sky of human hope ; but I will 
do what I can to get that infinite shadow out of the 
heart of man. 

" What do you propose in place of this?" 
Well, in the first place, I propose good fellow- 
ship — good friends all around. No matter what we 

6 



82 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



believe, shake hands and let it go. That is your 
opinion ; this is mine : let us be friends. Science 
makes friends; religion, superstition, makes ene- 
mies. They say: Belief is important. I say: No, 
actions are important. Judge by deed, not by 
creed. Good fellowship- — good friends — sincere 
men and women — mutual forbearance, born of 
mutual respect. We have had too many of these 
solemn people. Whenever I see an exceedingly 
solemn man, I know he is an exceedingly stupid 
man. No man of any humor ever founded a 
religion — never. Humor sees both sides. While 
reason is the holy light, humor carries the lantern, 
and the man with a keen sense of humor is pre- 
served from the solemn stupidities of superstition. 
I like a man who has got good feeling for every- 
body; good fellowship. One man said to another: 

" Will you take a glass of wine? " 

" I do not drink/' 

" Will you smoke a cigar?'* 

" I do not smoke." 

" Maybe you will chew something?" 

" I do not chew." 

"Let us eat some hay." 

"I tell you I do" not eat hay." 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



83 



"Well, then, good-by, for you are no company 
for man or beast." 

I believe in the gospel of Cheerfulness, the 
gospel of Good Nature ; the gospel of Good Health. 
Let us pay some attention to our bodies. Take 
care of our bodies, and our souls will take care of 
themselves. Good health ! And I believe the 
time will come when the public thought will be so 
great and grand that it will be looked upon as 
infamous to perpetuate disease. I believe the time 
will come when man will not fill the future with 
consumption and insanity. I believe the time will 
come when we will study ourselves, and understand 
the laws of health and then we will say: We are 
under obligation to put the flags of health in the 
cheeks of our children. Even if I got to heaven, 
and had a harp, I would hate to look back upon my 
children and grandchildren, and see them diseased, 
deformed, crazed — all suffering the penalties of 
crimes I had committed. 

I believe in the gospel of Good Living. You can 
not make any god happy by fasting. Let us have 
good food, and let us have it well cooked — and it 
is a thousand times better to know how to cook 
than it is to understand any theology in the world. 



84 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



I believe in the gospel of good clothes; I believe 
in the gospel of good houses ; in the gospel of 
water and soap. I believe in the gospel of intel- 
ligence ; in the gospel of education. The school- 
house is my cathedral. The universe is my bible. 
I believe in that gospel of justice, that we must 
reap what we sow. 

I do not believe in forgiveness as it is preached 
by the church. We do not need the forgiveness 
of God, but of each other and of ourselves. If I 
rob Mr. Smith and God forgives me, how does 
that help Smith ? If I, by slander, cover some 
poor girl with the leprosy of some imputed crime, 
and she withers away like a blighted flower and 
afterward I get the forgiveness of God, how does 
that help her ? If there is another world, we have 
got to settle with the people we have wronged in 
this. No bankrupt court there. Every cent must 
be paid. 

The Christians say, that among the ancient 
Jews, if you committed a crime you had to kill a 
sheep, now they say " charge it." " Put it on the 
slate." It will not do. For every crime you com- 
mit you must answer to yourself and to the one you 
injure. And if you have ever clothed another 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? ' 85 



with woe, as with a garment of pain, you will never 
be quite as happy as though you had not done 
that thing. No forgiveness by the gods. Eternal, 
inexorable, everlasting justice, so far as Nature is 
concerned. You must reap the result of your acts. 
Even when forgiven by the one you have injured, 
it is not as though the injury had not been done. 
That is what I believe in. And if it goes hard 
with me, I will stand it, and I will cling to my 
logic, and I will bear it like a man. 

And I believe, too, in the gospel of Liberty, in 
giving to others what we claim for ourselves. I 
believe there is room everywhere for thought, and 
the more liberty you give away, the more you will 
have. In liberty extravagance is economy. Let 
us be just. Let us be generous to each other. 

I believe in the gospel of Intelligence. That is 
the only lever capable of raising mankind. Intelli- 
gence must be the savior of this world. Humanity 
is the grand religion, and no God can put a man 
in hell in another world, who has made a little 
heaven in this. God cannot make a man miser- 
able if that man has made somebody else happy. 
God cannot hate anybody who is capable of loving 
anybody. Humanity — that word embraces all 
there is. 



86 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED t 



So I believe in this great gospel of Humanity. 

"Ah! but," they say, "it will not do. You 
must believe." I say, No. My gospel of health 
will bring life. My gospel of intelligence, my 
gospel of good living, my gospel of good-fel- 
lowship will cover the world with happy homes. 
My doctrine will put carpets upon your floors, 
pictures upon your walls. My doctrine will put 
books upon your shelves, ideas in your minds. 
My doctrine will rid the world of the abnormal 
monsters born of ignorance and superstition. 
My doctrine will give us health, wealth and 
happiness. That is what I want. That is what I 
believe in. Give us intelligence. In a little while 
a man will find that he can not steal without 
robbing himself. He will find that he cannot 
murder without assassinating his own joy. He 
will find that every crime is a mistake. He will 
find that only that man carries the cross who does 
wrong, and that upon the man who does right the 
cross turns to wings that will bear him upward 
forever. He will find that even intelligent self- 
love embraces within its mighty arms all the human 
race. 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



87 



11 Oh," but they say to me, " you take away 
immortality." I do not. If we are immortal it is a 
fact in nature, and we are not indebted to priests 
for it, nor to bibles for it, and it cannot be des- 
troyed by unbelief. 

As long as we love we will hope to live, and 
when the one dies that we love we will say : " Oh, 
that we could meet again," and whether we do or 
not it will not be the work of theology. It will be 
a fact in nature. I would not for my life destroy 
one star of human hope, but I want it so that 
when a poor woman rocks the cradle and sings a 
lullaby to the dimpled darling, she will not be 
compelled to believe that ninety-nine chances in a 
hundred she is raising kindling wood for hell. 

One world at a time is my doctrine. 
It is said in this Testament, " Sufficient unto the 
day is the evil thereof;" and I say: Sufficient 
unto each world is the evil thereof. 

And suppose after all that death does end all. 
Next to eternal joy, next to being forever with 
those we love and those who have loved us, next 
to that, is to be wrapt in the dreamless drapery of 
eternal peace. Next to eternal life is eternal sleep. 
Upon the shadowy shore of death the sea of 



88 



WHAT MUST WE BO TO BE SAVED f 



trouble casts no wave. Eyes that have been cur- 
tained by the everlasting dark, will never know 
again the burning touch of tears. Lips touched 
by eternal silence will never speak again the 
broken words of grief. Hearts of dust do not 
break. The dead do not weep. Within the tomb 
no veiled and weeping sorrow sits, and in the ray- 
less gloom is crouched no shuddering fear. 

I had rather think of those I have loved, and 
lost, as having returned to earth, as having become 
a part of the elemental wealth of the world — I 
would rather think of them as unconscious dust, I 
would rather dream of them as gurgling in the 
stream, floating in the clouds, bursting in the foam 
of light upon the shores of worlds, I would rather 
think of them as the lost visions of a forgotten 
night, than to have even the faintest fear that 
their naked souls have been clutched by an ortho- 
dox god. 

But for me, I will leave the dead where nature 
leaves them. Whatever flower of hope springs up 
in my heart I will cherish, I will give it breath of 
sighs and rain of tears. But I can not believe that 
there is any being in this universe who has created 
a human soul for eternal pain. I would rather that 



WHAT MUST WE DO TO BE SAVED? 



89 



every god would destroy himself; I would rather 
that we all should go to eternal chaos, to black and 
starless night, than that just one soul should suffer 
eternal agony. 

I have made up my mind that if there is a God, 
he will be merciful to the merciful. 

Upon that rock I stand. — 

That he will not torture the forgiving. — 

Upon that rock I stand. — 

That every man should be true to himself, and 
that there is no world, no star, in which honesty is 
a crime. 

Upon that rock I stand. 

The honest man, the good, kind, sweet woman, 
the happy child, have nothing tb fear, neither in 
this world nor the world to come. 
Upon that rock I stand. 



What Must We Do to 
be Saved? 



A LECTURE 
Robert G. Ingersoll. 

Interpolations are 'the. foundation stones of every Orthodox Church. 
Thorough!. v Revised and Corrected by the Author. 



Washington, D. C. 
C. P. FAR R ELL, PUBLISHER. 
- ' • 1 880. ^'V 



Ingersoll's Lectures, 



VOL. I. 

"THE GODS, AND OTHER LECTURES:" 

Robert G. Ingersoll, 

Contents. — "The Gods," "Humboldt," "Thomas Paine," "Individi-- 
ality," " Heretics and Heresies." 12 mo. 253 pp. 

Price in cloth, $1.25 ; postage g cts. Paper, 50 els. ; postage j ets. 

VOL. II. ' - / 

"THE GHOSTS, AND OTHER LECTURES:" 

Robert G. Ingersoll. 

Contents. — "The Ghosts," "Liberty of Man, Woman and Child," 
"Declaration of Independence," "Farming in Illinois," "Speech 
at Cincinnati," "A Vision of War." 121110.232pp. 

Price in doth, $1.25 ; postage 9 cts. Paper, 50 cts. ; postage 5 cts. 



Vols. I and II, bound in one, paper covers, price ■$ 1 .00 ; postage 10 cts. 
" " . " " morocco, gilt edges, price $5.00. 



These books are elegantly , bound and printed in clear, bold type, on heavy, 
tinted paper. 

The author takes the ground that man belongs to himself, and that each 
individual should at all hazards maintain his intellectual freedom. 

These lectures have createcL-the greatest sensation in the religious world 
since the days of Voltaire. Hundreds of pamphlets have been published, 
thousands of sermons have been preached, and numberless articles have been 
written against them, with the effect of increasing their popularity every day. 

They, have excited the hatred of the orthodox and bigoted, and the admira- 
tion of the intelligent and generous ; they are denounced by all believers in 
tyranny, in slavery, by the beaters of wives, the whippers of children, the 
believers in hell, the haters of progress, the despisers of reason, by all the 
cringers, crawlers, defamers of the dead, and by all the hypocrites now living. 
By a great many others, they are held in the highest esteem. 

Address all orders to 

C P. FARRELL, Publisher and Bookseller, 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 



VOL. III. V 

"SOME MISTAKES OF MOSES:" 

-.. . ^ " • BY * ' . ' . - ' _ \* 

Robert G. Ingersoll. 

This volume is printed on toned paper, in clear, bold type, and hand- 
mely bound in muslin, containing 278 pp., T2mo. ;NI .25. 

This book contains the/ principal points that Mr. Ingersoll has made 
against the Pentateuch in all his lectures on that subject. The pamphlets 
that have been sureptitiously issued are incorrect, filled with mistakes, and 
consist of only about fourteen or fifteen pag-es, "while" there are two hundred 
and seventy-eight pages in the" book just issued. The book is unanswerable 
in its facts and logic, inimitable in its style, avid filled with wit, satire, elo- 
quence, and pathos. 

A Vindication of Thomas Paine* By Robert G. Ingersoll. 

Thomas Pain e : a Criticism. By Moncure D. Conv, ay. ijmo; 
Paper. 25 cents. ■ 

Busts of JR. Gr. Ingersoll. By the celebrated sculptor, Clark 
Mills. Cabinet size, price 82. 50. 'Neatly packed ready for ship- 
ment. Every admirer of this great Apostle of Liberty should 
have one. 

Photographs of Mr. Ingersoll. By Stirony, the celebrated 
artist of New York, at the following prices : Imperial or large 
size, 4.0 cents ; Photo or card size, 30 cents ;. Life-size Lithograph, 
21x27, 50 cents. Postage paid. Liberal discount to the trade. 

Modern Thinkers ; What They Think, and IFhy. By V. 

B. Den slow, L. L. D. With an introduction by Robert G. 
Ingersoll. I Volume.' 12 mo. 350 pages. 8 Portraits. Sent 
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Notice to the Public. 



Washington, B. C., July 19, 1880. 
I wish to notify" the public that a Mr. Baldwin, of Chicago, also 
Rhodes & McClure, of the same place, are publishing pamphlet editions 
of my lectures. All the lectures published by them are grossly inaccurate, 
— filled with mistakes, horribly printed, and outrageously unjust to me. 
These men are simply literary thieves and pirates, and are obtaining 
money from the public under false pretenses. I take this course to warn 
the public that these publications are fraudulent. The only correct copies 
of my lectures are published by C. P. Farrell. All others are published 
by people who are willing to steal from me and defraud the public 
besides. These wretches have published one lecture under four titles, 
and several others under two or three. R. G. INGERSOLL, 



The People's Edition. 




Price, Twenty-Five Cents, 



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